As you are probably aware, there has been some restructuring going on with regard to the project and with the functioning and operation of our various teams. In particular, the teams relating to Production (PRO) of our various books have been almost completely reorganized and we are in the process of reviewing members for various positions. Some reorganization to teams coming under The Hobby Hub (THH) are also in the works; THH is the next step of the project, designed to address all the needs of hobbyists beyond just providing the game itself. We provide you with this information so you can understand the structure and processes for our project going forward.

It was also deemed important for you to understand the reasons behind some of the changes that have been made in this reorganization. As was previously mentioned, at the beginning of the project, we were under a tight time frame to put out a product that was balanced and sought to make all units in every army playable. While general external balance was achieved (with data feedback we are seeing where external balance issues are pending), internal balance was not always achieved for each army nor do all the units and/or items function in a manner that is desired. Likewise, the desire to have rules for each army that are true to the feel of the army was not always achieved. To this end, we will rework all the army books in conjunction with the background material for each army book. The goal is to reach the point where the rules reflect the “flavor” and “feel” of the individual army while at the same time adjusting units that do not function as intended and improving internal and external balance. The rules writing process is now going to be “background driven.” This means that the individuals that will review, edit and generate new rules for each army book will be using the background material for that army as a main driving force for creativity. Likewise, it is believed that it is advantageous to gather information from the community relating to the various army factions to ensure we understand what the community expects and wants. The new structure is designed to allow all this to happen.

Hot Fixes

Before this upcoming fall (late August / early September), there will be some small balance adjustments to all of the army books to provide some hot fixes to issues identified by our data feedback. These changes will be very limited and are not contemplated to include major design changes, which will be addressed as described above in the new process.

Version 2.0 - Basic Rule Book (a.k.a BRB, FBRB when background is incorporated)

There is going to be a major update to the BRB and Paths of Magic Book (PMB), to be released sometime in November of this year. Along with this release, all army books will be updated, to make them compatible with the changes in the rulebook. During this update we will also correct balance issues that requires deeper changes than what the hot-fixes in September allowed for.

We will give this version of the game a few months’ of public playtesting and proof reading to make sure all rules are clear and function as intended. At some point in early spring of 2017, a finalized Version 2.0 of the rulebook will be released, and we do not anticipate that the BRB will be changed after this release for some years, until at least all army books have been revised.

Full Army Books (FAB)

So, there will be a succession of phases (each phase lasting about 4 months) in which a FAB will be generated. When a FAB is created, all the current rules will be under review and it is anticipated that many new rules will be formulated to ensure the army book rules are true to its background. The processes will be described in forthcoming announcements.

Slim Army Books (SAB)

Additionally, during that succession of phases, a number SABs (from 0 to 4) will be reviewed and edited. The changes to the SABs may include any number of changes large and/or small, and including design changes depending on the needs of the particular AB.

More information on the finalized structure, function and operation of the new project structure will be announced soon.

Thank you for your wonderful support of our project,
The Ninth Age Team

Back then when it started, the “team” was not more than @lagge@fjugin and some other players involved in the Swedish comp. @arthain@el rey@Sir_Joker and @tiny joined shortly after, and the project had been started, with its 6 founding members, from 5 nationalities.
As @Dan says: "So two Swedes, a Spaniard, an Austrian, a Dane, and a German all walk into a bar..."

As @tiny recalls, recruiting started around mid-September with the 0.5 release. The 5 RT members had been working day and night to get this done in time and when the documents were released, they were burned out, while now over 300 active forum members commented on their work like there is no tomorrow.
It was clear we needed help to have structured discussions with the community and within a few days we recruited the first around 20 Army Support members. (reference: - the-ninth-age.com/news/index.p…ject-staff-member-wanted/)
Shortly after, we started to recruit for the Armybook Committees (reference - the-ninth-age.com/news/index.p…anted-army-book-creation/and the result: the-ninth-age.com/news/index.p…-the-armybook-committees/).
By end of September, we had reached about 120 staff members out of the original 6 founding members and the number of required job position kept on growing. It very much felt like building a startup with all the good and bad which come with it. We barely had the time to tell people what their new position was all about. By the end of 2015, we had about 200 staff members and speed started to slow down a little, so we had a bit more time to focus on internal processes and the different roles within the project.

One year after the project started, we have currently 270 staff members from 29 nationalities on different positions within the team, plus 50 additional members who have participated as members at some stage in the past.
Their origins? 29 countries over the world: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Macedonia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, UK, and USA.

That’s a pretty neat multinational startup!

T9A community
This team comes from the community: you!
Who are you?
You are 7,793 members.

The connexions are mostly made by males: 93.16%, which leaves some 6.84% for the female population.
Mostly a boy's hobby, but not exclusively. Guys, behave!
The median age turns around 30. You youngsters!

The nationalities are very diverse!
2,835 of you have entered your location on the map.
In order to take into account those of you who did not, the data below is taken from where the web sessions come from.

Already very early during the project the ETC's voted with 38 participating countries for T9A as official system. This was a very clear sign of trust of the gaming communty to support the project.

The most important achieved by the project team is therefore, of course, to have delivered the rules as promissed on time.
The rules in their V1.0 spread over no less than… 733 pages!
This includes the cards, the FAQ and the two versions of UD and SE army books.
It makes a pretty decent book!
And all of this is currently being fully translated in French, German, Italian, Polish and Spanish (the previous version was all translated, the current version is imminent - you understand that having these 733 pages flawlessly translated in 6 languages requires some time).
And this does not include all the previous versions, found in 4,805 M of archives (in English, plus more in the other 5 languages).

These rulebooks have proven to be a popular download.
The v1.0 rulebook in English has been downloaded no less than 60.282 times!
The army books have been downloaded 214,338 times in total, which averages to 3.56 AB per BRB.
Magic rules, strangely, have been downloaded only 26.356 times, which means that only 44% of the BRB downloads are complemented by the magic lores, for some reason . 6,762 cards of magic have been downloaded, roughly ¼ of magic lore downloads.

We would probably all love to get some insight into the workings of the 9th Age's senior management and today @oncebitten360​ provides us with just that: an interview with @Digger614​ and @Dan​, where he asks them how and why they joined our project. They also give insight into their expectations for the future and which challenges still need to be overcome. It's highly interesting, check it out:

The Ninth Age (T9A) respects the intellectual property (IP) rights of all companies. T9A has not received nor ever received any notice relating to the IP rights of any company. T9A takes any allegation of IP infringement seriously and has gone to great lengths to ensure compliance with the law. To that end, T9A decided from an very early point in development to develop an entirely new world, storyline and artwork. It is the desire of T9A to provide an engrossing fantasy table top game for the community of fantasy players free of charge. We also hope that the community will continue to support the many miniatures companies that manufacture and sell miniatures that are useable with the game we love.

VS Sneak peak
The glorious armies of the Vermin Swarm has prevailed in 0.11, but the time has come to look to the future and how the Vermin Swarm army can expand its hidden empire to stretch over vastly greater dominions. The senate has convened and all has been heeded. Then, in typical Vermin Swarm manner, the council ignored all advice from their lackeys and bickered for days on end. The Siccara representatives tried to assassinate the Plague representatives by writing the word cheese on bottles of rat poison but the Plague representatives just ate the whole thing anyway and asked for more. Once all had come to a final agreement, a Fetthis representative ate the document by mistake (he mistook it for a piece of cheese) so the process had to be started over again with even more bickering. Finally, it was decided that the direction the Vermin Swarm army had been moving towards, with MSU army with monster mash and extreme gunlines, had to change. Too many slaves were dying to breed up all the monsters and summon all the Daemons, and the Rakachit Organization Dark Shards were in short supply. Coincidentally, the 0.11 direction was also not favored by either the 9th age developers nor by the community, so several changes (both buffs and nerfs) where implanted to steer the army away from this.

The Vermin Daemon, the big elephant in the room, was tired of being summoned to each and every game and even more so having to look at his own reflection on the battlefield all the time. All Vermin Daemons held a council and decided that they now only will send one Vermin Daemon to aid the Vermin Swarm, no matter how many Magisters call for them. Furthermore, the council decided to only send the little cousins of the Exalted Vermin Daemons, but that these cousins will be linked to the cults, organizations and schools of the Vermin Swarm society.

Some old magic items that were never used have been removed and some new magic items have been added to allow for better synergy with the armies strong points. The implosion sphere has imploded upon itself and a new magic weapon utilizing the mass horde aspect of the Vermin Swarm army has been added.

Tyrants and chiefs, the main close combat characters, were not used by the Vermin Swarm army to much extent (except as BsBs and MurderbladeLords). Therefore, they received a point decrease and/or access to new mundane equipment. One such option will be a vile brew that can be sneaked into the Gruyere cheese that unsuspecting units of Rats-at-Arms and Vermin Guard eat on the eve before a battle (it's tradition, we promise). The units will then gain a random special rule that boosts the close combat ability (such as devastating charge).

The Doom Bell was brought up many times by the Magisters, but they could not come to any consensus on what was best for it. Thus, in true political fashion, nothing has been done. The Magisters promise that they will fight for the Bell during the next senate meeting, so have hope!

Upon request from several Magisters and Tyrants to add more “Vermin Swarm feel” to the army, some ranged weapons now have the possibility to backfire. The Rakachit Organization objected as they think this is a plot to hinder their plan of world domination by making their favorite toys blow up, but the remaining Vermin Swarm society ignored their objections.

By this time, the large masses of the Vermin Swarm army were beginning to ruffle as they were annoyed of all the new things happening around them. To nip this rebellion in the bud, and to buff the overall close combat ability of the army, most rank and file infantry units received a small point decrease or other buffs. The large masses were happy with this and went back to eating their Gruyere cheese.

Weapon teams, the slightly smaller elephants in the slightly smaller room, have been moved to special instead of core to remove the possibility of flooding the mandatory core points with these. To compensate, the weapon teams are not restricted by other units, so Vermin Swarm players are now allowed to field up to three teams regardless of what is in the rest of the army (ok, not regardless, you cannot take pointy eared elf things in the army, that doesn’t make sense, but you get our point).

The Meatgrinder, the sad excuse for a weapon team that no Tyrant would touch with a thirteen foot pole (even if the pole was made up of Swiss cheese), will also see an important change as it competes for the same entry as the other weapons teams, but has a significantly different role to play.

Fetthis has been complaining recently about the state of their Vermin Hulks, claiming that they were being poisoned by the Plague cult. After a brief bout of aggressive negotiations, Feethis negotiated augmentations that allows for sculpting of the unit to specific needs, accompanied by a small point increase.

The Undernational Union of jeZail rIflerats (UUZI) met and decided that they were being undervalued. To resolve this, they increased their wage and

The theme of the Beast Herds army is all about having fast and hard-hitting troops. Sure, we don’t have cavalry, armour, or powerful shooting, but we are resilient in our own way and can deliver a punch before you know what hit you. This theme guided our decisions as we sought to address the feedback from the community, the Rules Team, and the Balance Board.

The Beast Herds book was considered to be at about the correct power level overall, but it needed to be adjusted to get rid of abusive builds (combos that were not fun to play against or were too powerful) and to create better internal balance. We also sought solutions such that units did not have to pay for advantages they did not plan to use.

The ability to ambush is central to this army. However, nobody wants to play against an opponent that can drop super powerful stuff behind your lines. So a few common-sense rules were put into place, such as Drunk units no longer being able to ambush. We also changed the pricing structure of ambushing units, and it will now be an optional upgrade rather than being built into the unit’s base price. We did this so that units that do not ambush no longer have to pay a premium for that ability.

Characters

Minotaur Warlords will no longer be able to field minotaurs as core units. One of the changes across all the army books is that core units need to not be elite – and minotaurs are nothing if not elite. However, to compensate for this loss, the new Lord of Bulls rule will cause all minotaurs to always remain frenzied.

Beastlords are a little cheaper now, and Hunting Call is an optional upgrade. Again, we didn’t want to pay for an unused ability. Hunting Call is a little different, as it now only works on units with the Pack Tactics special rule and can only be used to reroll failed ambush rolls. This ability was a little too powerful for units that are already on the border of being too powerful to ambush (looking at giants, centaurs, etc.). We also wanted to avoid situations where a player rerolled successful ambush roles in order to deny their opponent legitimate game turns. Also, Beastlords are a significant part of a new Longhorns special rule (see below).

Troops

Wildhorns are now cheaper. They lost Light Armour because we felt it was not fitting to the theme of the army, and we thought it better to make them as cheap as possible. Also, the ability to ambush is an optional upgrade for a flat cost for the unit (i.e. you don't pay per model, but per unit), but ambushing units are limited to 25 models. As said above, we wanted to be an aggressive army with the ability to ambush lots of stuff, but we are trying to balance that in a way that people will enjoy playing against us. Dropping a 50-model unit behind someone’s line does not make for an enjoyable game for our opponents.

Mongrel Herd changed in a similar as the Wildhorns – and for the same reasons. They now start at 20 models. Like above the ambush upgrade is a flat cost for the unit cost for units up to 30 models. Also, the Insignificant rule has been removed, so now characters can join them.

Mongrel Raiders now start with 10 models at a cheaper price. We wanted their price per model to represent their abilities, and across all the armies the RT is trying to ensure that any single unit is worth at least a decent amount of points. So, we thought that increasing the Mongrel Raiders starting size without increasing the overall cost very much was the best way to go.

Longhorns underwent quite a few minor changes in an attempt to balance several needs. We needed them, as an elite unit, to cost as much as elite units in other armies, but we also needed their abilities to reflect that price. So, they will see a drop in their base price, and additional models will be a bit more expensive. The cost to ambush is being reduced to only 1 ppm. But. BUT. HOLD ON TO YOUR HATS!!! They now have the Bodyguard (Beastlord) special rule. That’s right! Longhorns and Beastlords just became a lot more attractive, which is good because they were underused in the last edition.

Razortusk Chariot got scythes, which was a much-needed improvement to differentiate this unit from the Raiding Chariot. It also gained an optional upgrade that grants charging benefits to units within 6 inches. (Remember our theme of being a fast army?

Gortach was too strong for its points, as evidenced by its inclusion in most tournament lists. It is now leadership 9 and no longer has ID(5) vs shooting. Also, if you field one or more Gortachs, then Minotaur Warlords become one-of-a-kind. (Two Minotaur Warlords and two Gortachs is simply too brutal of a combination.) We decided to make these changes in its rules in order to prevent a price increase.

Jabberwock received a price reduction and a slight increase in its Innate Defense upgrade. BUT, its aura ability now affects ALL units – even those that are ItP. We wanted to keep this monster cheap, and the ID upgrade was almost an auto-include. Also, we

It is time to bring you up to speed with what's happening with the Sylvan Elves.
These past few months saw several versions of our Armybook, each time bringing a mixed bag of changes: sometimes they gave us nothing but despair, but sometimes they brought candies and joy. All of these changes reflect the combined effort of the Guys Below, or more specifically the Armybook Committee, Balancing Board and Rules Team. The ultimate goal is to balance the armies and to get rid of overpowered and imbalanced stuff. Behind the upcoming book stand several people with cojones who sacrificed so much of their time to bring this roller-coaster to the next checkpoint.

Speaking of balance! At the current stage, Sylvan Elves are considered one of the top-tier armies. More precisely, there are two lists which outshine any other combinations from our book. Those are Tree spirits lists, and avoidance lists. A wise man once said: “The most important part of the sneak peek is not to show you that something has been changed, but why something has been changed” (looking at you mr. little man), so we are not going to present you every change made in upcoming version of our Armybook (and there are quite a few), but leave you to find them out when the book is released come March. Without further ado (and pointless blabbering, if I may add), here are the most important changes:

1) The army-wide special rule has been revisited, in an effort to define what is crucial to the SE in terms of gameplay and identity. In the 9th age no race gets "freebies", so having a special rule that grants many bonuses could have reflected badly on the units, in terms of overall cost. We decided to drop the "Fight in Extra Ranks" part of the Forest Walker, and to move the Armour Piercing just to the units that need it. This way, archers and sentinels do not have to pay for a rule that they will probably not be using. The solution we've come up with also ensures the balance of combat characters, as it had been brought to our attention that the fact that they got AP(1) with magical weapons was making them slightly overpowered. Tree singing became cheaper and gained S5 at the expense of AP, and lost the attribute of the Path of Nature.

Bladedancer kindred had become overburdened with too many rules for just one pointy-ear, so in the new version it no longer provides amazing profile bonuses or a ward save, but instead creates a nice synergy with the unit of bladedancers it joins.

The second big change concerns the Wild Huntsmenkindred. These bad boys are back, boosted by free reform. This comes at an expense, since the kindred's cost has been upped to reflect the added versatility, while at the same time the Wild Huntsmen will be less heavily armored than before.

When talking about Aspects, this is where you’ll find changes regarding the Tree spirits lists we mentioned above. Fertile seeds became infertile and got ditched from the book. Toxic Spores became susceptible to the winds which shortened their range, and it seems Dryads decided to strike on Entwined Roots which became exclusive for Thicket Beasts only. All these were measures taken to tone down the power of certain aspects of the book (S5 core Dryads, I'm looking at you).

3) The magic item section saw a lot of modifications, since it quickly became apparent that certain items were either too good and got used all the time or too situational to be of any use. The Bladedancer Drums became a lot more usable, the Spear of Cadaron got a different role that differentiates it from the Whirlwind blade, and a new entry came to replace the Ancient Brooch, whose cost post-balancing would have been prohibitive in our opinion. The Fire Blight Pendant will make some of you nostalgic fellows smile, at the expense of the enemy's strength.

4) Our beloved Treefathers got hit by a nerfonball (TM). Dwarves swear it wasn’t theirs. Next in row to balance 4 Big-daddy-trees lists, it was decided to limit their presence on the field to max 3. It was a daunting task to confront these 4 big nasties at the same time; besides, they are the rarest of the all spirits, aren’t they? Avatar of Nature got a price increase to better reflect what it brings to the table, and Impaling Roots became optional.

5) Dryad Matriarchs became more customizable, too. Now, the plain Matriarch costs as much as one eagle, but it doesn’t inspire hatred in other dryads nor it does cast any spells, unless you decide to upgrade her. Now every ability of the model is properly costed and in line with our balancing efforts, but you are not forced to get the whole package if you only want a combat forest spirit to give Hatred to your Dryads.

6 ) In a Chess-like maneuver, Kestrel Knights and Sentinels swapped their places in Special and Rare.Kestrel Knights have received some love and we are hoping they will see some play in your armies, other than continuing to collect dust on your… [Read More]

The Warriors of the Dark Gods were above the desired benchmark, as a few builds consistently over performed. The review was a tough one for all parties, and took a whopping 4 hours. The army has had some major internal design changes and a few builds were addressed in particular. Here are some of the most important revisions:

1. Marks of the Dark Gods were redesigned on many levels. To begin, pricing has changed. Since different Marks give different features to different units, in the long run sticking with same price for all of them caused some internal balance problems. In the new update the price of each mark will vary for each unit. One mantra of T9A project is to avoid any auto-includes, and MoL chariots, MoC characters and MoW everything else were becoming just that. The new pricing will address this.

Regarding internal balance, even with the new pricing structure for marks it was likely that some of them would never see play. Therefore, every mark but the Mark of Change got a slight redesign in order to make them more unique. The new Marks are more tactical, promoting good maneuvering and discouraging deathstars. Also, their roles are clearer now:

MoW — Offensive: +1 to-hit to the front, can't declare flee.

MoP — Defensive: -1 to-hit from the front (but no worse than on 5+), -1 Initiative for the marked model.

Finally, the stacking of Marks and "ubermarks" were always on weak foundations balance wise, and with the overall toning down of the power level they had to go away.

2. Gaze of the Gods gives re-roll to-hit and to-wound the next turn after killing a Monster/Character in a challenge. The current table for the Gaze of the Gods was too complex for what it brought to the table. It saw play maybe once a battle and would always require checking the book because the table, especially the secondary effects, was hard to memorize. Relatedly, Trolls havelost Warped Regeneration.

3. Complete overhaul of Magical Items and Gifts. This was the #1 priority for the ABC, as they felt that when the book was first published there was not enough time to design the items properly. Many of the old gifts/items were removed and some of the ones that stayed have been changed. It's only a Sneak Peak so we're not going to lay it all out, but some of the important changes are:

Nine Tailed Standard now only gives non-Skirmish infantry +1 Movement, but its price has dropped and the bubble effect is still there.

Out of the four god-specific banners, all of them but the Banner of Transmutation are available for 25 pts.

All the Dark Gods have a separate dedicated gift now - 3 of them are old gifts, but one is completely new.

The Once-Chosen gift is back!

Some of the gifts and items that were removed entirely are:

Crushing Strength

Blessed by the Dark Gods

Dagger of Change

Beguiling Chains

4. Lust Ubermark gives Skirmish and +2 Movement to Chosen and Once-Chosen, but only starting-size units are able to take this upgrade (10 for Chosen and 3 for Once-Chosen). Since the old Lust-marked Chosen hardly ever saw play, we tried a bit of outside-of-the-box thinking and gave it a more flavorful function which was in line with the general concept for Marks and hopefully could also open a new playstyle. That's right: Uberfallen.

5. Monster Mash with Daemon Prince, Elder Dragon Centaur and 2x2 Crushers was dominating tournament lists and with the changes happening across the board had to be addressed. Fielding this setting in the standard formats is still possible but not with full kit anymore. The flying version was also limited in that WDG can now only field a maximum of 2 Large Targets with Fly, though as always there are upgrades allowing you to circumvent this rule.

6. Core Wasteland Chariots were too obvious a choice for the standard WDG playstyles and were moved to special. However, this came with returning them to their elite T5 status and with the option to play them in core if you field your General on a Chariot. Another change, prompted by community feedback, is that the Chariot profiles were merged with the Mauler Chariot, which is now an upgrade that increases the chariot's survivability but limits its speed. These can't be taken as core, though.

7. Wrath Priest was rarely seen, even in mono-Wrath lists, and as a result was heavily buffed. At the start of the game the player can choose one of the three Special Rules, once of which allows the model to count as a Wizard Master for dispelling if no friendly wizards are present on the battlefield.

8. Hellcannon has gotten a redesign too. We streamlined the unbreakable option with the Daemon Prince and simplified the overall design a bit. Now it has Movement 4 and two modes of fire: if it doesn't move it has longer range and higher Strength. The -1 Ld penalty for panic is gone, but the panic test is still obligatory if it inflicts… [Read More]

From the inception of The 9th Age (T9A) project, a central idea has been to create a balanced game system that players may use any or all of their existing models as good representatives of the units listed in the various Army Books. At this point, T9A is still in the early stages of balancing with the stabilization of the ruleset being the top priority. However, the question has been raised relating to characters: will T9A include special characters? Additionally, it has been asked, as T9A continues to grow, how will the project be kept new and fresh seeing as T9A is not a model company and does not have the ability to create new models?

On the first issue, as was stated above, the primary focus of T9A right now is on reaching a stable rule set that achieves a well-balanced game. At some point in the future, the team will begin the introduction of special characters and their associated rules. Again, the focus will be to allow players to use their existing character models as good representations of the new special characters that are introduced into the game.

On the second issue, in addition to the introduction of special characters as discussed above, at some point in the future, new units/characters/monsters will be contemplated to be included as updates to or new versions of the various Army Books. So how will players obtain models representative of the new units/characters/monsters seeing as T9A is a not for profit community project and not a model manufacturing company?

Already at this very early stage of game development T9A has been contacted by a number of model manufacturing companies expressing interest in manufacturing models to support T9A. To this end, for those reputable companies that contact us and are interested in supplying models, we will create a list Cooperating Companies that will be supplied early release information relating to various new units/characters/monsters to be added. This information will be supplied at very early stages of design/development so as to allow the time needed to create the sculptures, generate the molds and produce the miniatures that will represent the new units/characters/monsters.
To be clear, T9A is not a model manufacturing company and will not be affiliated with any of the Cooperating Companies. However, we will allow the various Cooperating Companies to advertise on T9A website to make it easy for players to see where they can buy models representative of the units/characters/monsters contained in the rules.

We are very happy of the broad support that the community has provided thus far for T9A project. The greater the support for T9A, the more incentive model manufacturing companies have to support the future expansion of T9A. So we thank You, the community, for making T9A as successful has it has been so far and hope to see even more success in the future.